Breaking the Barriers
by CrossRow
Summary: They both desire something better from Gotham. Post The Dark Knight Rises One shot. Bat & Cat.


**Breaking the Barriers  
**

**All characters belong to Christopher Nolan and DC Comics  
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**I do own own any of these characters.**

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"You need to stop running," he says with the faintest whisper, it sounds like a breath. "There is nothing to run back to, Selina Kyle." He is close to her, the colors of molten golden and green capture darkness.

The scent of his masculine essence and the smoky haze of the city unfolds around her, she can stop herself inhaling the comforting smell as her heart becomes steady. His words are simple, direct and sincere.

He lowers his Kevlar body down on the hood of the GCPD squad car, black cape drapes over his entire shape, he only allows her to see the bat insignia in the center of his plated chest. His piercing eyes sear through her, she breathes in the frosty air, feels it fill her lungs.

His gauntlet forearms curl around her slim waist, glove fingers softly move in a circular motion on her back as he caresses his touch on her black spandex neoprene suit, soothing her to point of stillness in the darkness of the alley. Selina tears her brown eyes away from his face, but the prompting in her chest urges her to look back. His eyes gleam with warmth and comfort, as much as his touch moving down the curves of her body.

"Bruce…"

She wants to disappear into the night, she usually runs from situations like this. She doesn't want to have smooth begins. Everything needs to be hard and risky when it comes to living in her black and white world.

She refuses to show weakness to him, they are still strangers in the night, parallel souls lost in a murky configuration of misery and abandonment.

Wayward drifters who will keep on searching for freedom, whether beyond the shorelines of mortality or beyond the grave.

When she stares into his concealed hazel eyes, she sees the flickers of unguarded want that twists his own will. Jabs her own heart.

Hunger grows in his eyes of melting steel.

It some ways it terrifies as she feels the attachment to the savior of Gotham City.

Selina stares at him, absorbing every detail of his form with uncertain eyes. Everything about him spells darkness, allure and power. His pointed eared mask is a menacing symbol, a jagged graphite silhouette of a man's aggression and purpose.

Protective Kevlar and tri-weave fiber covers his bulky and slender body like a second skin. The long cape resembles the wings of a bat, his exposed jaw line is a masterpiece of chiseled flesh and indents of youth. His soft, thinned lips have a light flush of pink and arched with shadow. His eyes are daggers with mixtures of the autumn moon and a green lush of a foreboding forest.

"I left you broken," she says, conviction rises in her throat. "That to me is unforgivable to rake off."

At first he is silent, there is a division within him of memory and regret. His flesh burns behind the darkness of his mask, and heart pounds with a dull ache in his rib cage. The semblance of Batman begins to slip away, it's painful but necessary. He is ready to break the barriers keeping them distant from the hope that still flickers. At this moment, he is entrapped in a haze of delusion.

_Can I love her?_ He asks his own heart. _Can I finally live to love?_

"There is no going back, Selina." he finally answers, his voice broken. He swallows. "Everything that happens to us. No longer exists."

She stares at him, searching for resolve in the traces of darkness. And then she unveils a cruel response that only condemns her. "My heart doesn't exist."

"That's where you're wrong." He says, his eyes level with her dark orbs. "If you believed that why did you help me save Gotham?"

"I have my reasons." she interjects, her voice is a whisper and defiant.

"When you kissed me?" he slices the silence between them with a soft voice. "Did you mean it?"

Selina froze, her heart thuds to a standstill. She parts her red lips, releasing a compress breath and feel a chill erupt within her. The fiercely independent woman begins to slip away.

She pauses in thought, recollection with her mortals as strands of her sleek, long mahogany hair twirls in the frosty air. She becomes caught in a division of choice, not allowing herself to become consistent with the direction of her goals to finally grasp the freedom she wants.

The woman she had always known herself to be, the fiercely independent survivor of a distasting society or human error suddenly dissolves with the tears that escape from her dark brown eyes. She becomes a shattered mirror of broken dreams and regrets, jaded pieces of ice that melted into a forgotten shadow of her own murky soul.

There was no turning back, no more living under the gun and fighting her demons. She has finally received her escape route of having a life worth living-_A fresh start._

If the doubt of spending the rest of her life in a cell at Blackgate crosses the path of thought in her mind, she slices it with truth and shoves it into a black hole, covering it with redemption. She knows deep in her heart, she was no longer a fugitive of the shadow of the past. She finally releases everything locked up inside of her, through the tears branding on her pale skin-showing her that she was no longer a captive to the illusion of her sins.

No longer a thief in her own heart.

"Yes," she answers his question, with a sincere, uncharacteristic tone in her low voice. "It was real."

He feels a grace of a genuine smile play across his lips, "We're real." he replies, his voice husky and true. "No more masks." He places his gloves on the sides of the cowl, and slowly lifts it off his face. His head tilts back as dark tendrils flop over his sweaty forehead. He breathes out relief and throws the mask on the frozen ground.

She hesitates to meet his stare, everything is alarming and unnatural. Her eyes drift to the empty street, milky crescents of light are captives in her uncertain gaze. She feels a fever rise in her heart, making a foregin illness strike her own. "I can't give you what you want, Mr. Wayne."

Selina dares herself to look at his handsome face, there's a few bruises on his razor-edge cheek and jaw but everything is intact. His beautiful lips are unbelievably softening in the cold breeze buffeting her skin and his hazel eyes shimmer with accepting warmth.

"I'm not expecting you too, Miss Kyle." his voice answers, he curves the sharp edges of his mouth into a misty grin.

She creases her brow, swallowing down disbelief and looks deeply into his hazel eyes, "I don't give anything. I take it away." her voice becomes a grim whisper. "That's how it works with me, handsome." He sees an old wound pierce through her. She fears attachment, losing something and becoming dead to love.

Bruce pulls himself in close, his gloved finger curls under her jaw, he tilts his head ever so slightly, his the shape of his arrow nose brushes against the side of her nose, they form a diamond with the symmetry of their faces. "You have me a chance." he whispers, his warm breath moves over her frigid skin. "To live again." He reveals, his fingers lip under the straps of her mask and slowly ease it off her face.

"I couldn't let you die without living away from the gun," she says, lips firm and heart steady.

His forehead rests against hers, tendrils fall in his eyes. His upper lip curls barely touching her lip as the roundness of his chin shadows over hers, she feels compelled to say her forgiveness to him, but slowly he takes all her guilt and remorse away from her in that one second she feels his mouth press against hers. His lips open as he kisses her upper lip with soft, moisture, he relishes the liquid sugar of her as it drips down his throat. He feels her tense, and swallow as his gloved fingers trace the skin of her neck with a feathery touch of warmth.

"Selina," he whispers hotly into her lips as he softly cushions her mouth with incredible softness. "Come with me."

"Why?" she echoes, her heart twists into an uncomfortable squeeze in her chest.

"I think you know the reason," he breathes out with a soft breeze of air. His hand pulls off her mask, and he stares into her beautiful coffee colored eyes and sees the glints of dawn in her tender gaze. "You want freedom... I want a life. We can both compromise."

"We'll hate each other." She ejects, his cape drapes over her body. She traces his upper lip with her thumb. "I can't guarantee that I'll stop stealing."

"True," he lifts his head with a small grin cross his lips. "I think I handle it."

She narrows her eyes, heaves out a breath, "Arlight, Mr. Wayne." she says with a sure, optimistic voice. "I accept enticing your offer."

He smiles. His lips hover over her mouth and then he kisses her for the second time, long, deep with nothing holding him back.

She kisses him with equal, rough caresses, she feels her lips move under his as they seal the deal.

They are now dead to Gotham.

And alive with the ashes of regrets cloaking their bodies to seek and discover the true meaning of love.

**Fin.**

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**Let me know what you guys think, if you hate or love it.**


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